Last Word on Low

Low Week at Do You Compute has ended. As I re-posted the first entry here, so I'll re-post the conclusion as well. I really enjoyed going deep into these records this week and I hope you followed along. Here's a quick rundown of everything that went up:

• I Could Live in Hope
• On "Sunshine," from that record
• Long Division
• Transmission EP
• The Curtain Hits the Cast
• On "Prisoner," from the Finally... EP
• Songs for a Dead Pilot (originally posted in a longer form last year here)
• Secret Name

And the conclusion, "On Love and Low," below.

It’s 1997. Low is on tour, playing Tempe for the second time in less than a year. The first time was the very same week Transmission was released; they opened for Soul Coughing and were roundly booed throughout their set. This time—right around when The Curtain Hits the Cast came out—the setting is more appropriate. Low are the headliners, playing a record store packed with about 100 devoted (and silent) fans. It’s an amazing show. Among other things, Sparhawk—wearing a GodheadSilo t-shirt, by the way—reveals that the album version of “Words” is actually “the fast version.”

When the show is over I head for the stage, where their merchandise is scattered on the ground. No new music—I’ve already got all the LPs, EPs, and 7”s they’re hawking. I do notice a bright, sea-blue t-shirt lampooning the poster for the movie Jaws: the great white lunges ferociously up from the ocean with the word “LOW” written above in bright orange all-caps lettering. It’s sort of a genius t-shirt, if a little ugly. I don’t buy it.

*

It’s 1999 and I’ve met a brilliant girl. Among other ways we discover we’re meant for each other, there is an exchange of music and musical ideas. She introduces me to Rufus Wainwright, Jeff Buckley, and Fred Astaire; I introduce her to Cat Power, Ida, and Low. I had a cassette at the time that I kept in my car—it was all of Low’s 7”s and b-sides collected together. “I Started a Joke,” “Venus,” “No Need,” “Lord, Can You Hear Me?”. One of their earliest b-sides was from a food-themed compilation released around the time of their first album; the song was called “Peanut Butter Toast and American Bandstand.” We’d sing that one together.

• Low: Peanut Butter Toast and American Bandstand

*

It’s strange to think that I’ve fallen out of love with Low. Or, more accurately, that I’ve stopped keeping up. Maybe it was inevitable: three of my posts this week implied that I was anticipating the moment Low would become predictable. What made Low one of the seminal indie bands of the 90s was that they triumphed in the face of that anticipation so many times. Perhaps that’s why Things We Lost in the Fire, from 2001, was ultimately the last Low album I was to buy. It wasn’t a bad record by any means—I’ve heard some say it’s among their best—but for me, who’d been on board with everything they did for seven years running, it was the first release that sounded… like Low. It was good, but it wasn’t a revelation.

*

It’s Christmas of 1999 and we’ve been together for all of six months. Low release their Christmas EP and my brilliant girlfriend brings it over. The first song, “Just Like Christmas,” is unlike anything the group had ever done before! For one thing, someone is playing a full drum set. Better yet, it sets my brilliant girlfriend off on a tear of Christmas joy. She dances around the apartment and plays the song over and over.

• Low: Just Like Christmas

*

I just listened to Things We Lost in the Fire for the first time in at least six years, maybe longer. It really is a fine album. It’s almost cruel of me to say it had to be “a revelation” in order for me to stick with them. But that’s the bar they’d set. The album was again produced by Steve Albini, and it’s clear the group had reached a level of comfort with the sound they’d begun honing three years earlier on Songs for a Dead Pilot. The biggest difference on this album was the addition of Mimi Parker’s sister, who had previously added her voice to “Long Way Around the Sea” from their Christmas EP. The harmonies throughout Fire are therefore much sweeter, hewing closer to the vibe of frequent tourmates Ida. It’s a nice effect, and its sweetness juxtaposes against the fact that this album might be the darkest record Low had made to date. Tracks like “Whore” and “Embrace” and “Kind of Girl” feel like Low are walking a line right at the edge of darkness.

• Low: Whore

*

 

It’s 2000 and my brilliant girlfriend has a present for me. It’s a t-shirt I once saw at a Low concert three years earlier. Apparently earlier that year, when Low were in town touring on Secret Name, she approached Alan Sparhawk and described the shirt to him. He told her they still had some back home, gave her his phone number, and told her to call him once they finished their tour. She called him a few months later and he sent the shirt.

 

*

I have a hard time listening to Cat Power. Old Cat Power, new Cat Power, whatever. Everything about Cat Power just reminds me of a down time in my life and it’s simply no fun to listen to her. I can recognize the genius that is Moon Pix, but I can’t bear to hear more than one song at a time.

I don’t have the same issue with Low, though I listened to their music at the same time (longer, actually, which might be the reason they’re still okay). Still, the period in which I stopped listening to new Low albums happens to coincide with the period in which I became much happier. I stopped listening to Cat Power around the same time. Writing these posts this week it occurs to me that my love of Low happens to coincide with the period in my life in which I went from my first girlfriend to getting married, and whatever transpired in between. Is that a coincidence? Did I lose interest in Low because they had become predictable, or because I had overcome a kind of sadness I wasn’t ever fully aware of?

*

It’s late September 2001. Our families have stepped onto airplanes—a brave and awkward thing to do that month, that year—in order to come to Tempe to see us married. We were three weeks removed from a world-changing tragedy in New York, one month shy of our own life-changing move to New York, and smack in the middle of the most important day of our lives. We were married. We kept the wedding small and intimate: at our house, with our friends and family taking care of the food and the music and photography and decor. It was in many ways a very simple event—the ceremony itself took, I think, about ten minutes—but of course also very profound. This year will be our eighth anniversary. Next month, in about three weeks actually, we will have known each other for ten years—approximately a third of our lifetimes. We still sing “Peanut Butter Toast and American Bandstand.”

At the reception we did our first dance to “Two-Step,” by Low. It was the start of a new chapter.

• Low: Two-Step

Comments

[Alex]

"Did I lose interest in Low because they had become predictable, or because I had overcome a kind of sadness I wasn’t ever fully aware of?" - I'm sure the personal was part of it, but I've had the same experience countless times & attribute it to the moment when you realize that the band has mapped its world, and that everything from that point on would be reexaminations of known territories or self-conscious, quixotic side trips. And it doesn't mean that I don't like or don't listen to those bands anymore; it just means that I don't have to. For me, one measure of a band's greatness is how that sequence of essential listening records is.

[Scott pgwp]

Yes - that's definitely a huge part of it. And I'm not alone in thinking things we lost in the fire was the last worthwhile record to purchase (if the comments to the previous post are any indication). I've got another post percolating in my brain right now on just what you're talking about - "mapping their territory" is a good way of describing it.

[Richard]

Oddly, though, recent Low records have sounded to me like they've tried to expand their world, as if they were aware that Things We Lost In the Fire was the end of a period for them. The results have been mixed.

Also, I hate when people boo an opening act.

[scott pgwp]

Man, it was brutal.

[James]

I saw Low open for Wilco, and the result was the same. It was actually my introduction to Low. I'm sure Alan has some good stories about the worst shows.

[Richard]

See, the thing is, the headliner usually chooses the opening act, right? Do people not know this? Do they not realize the insult to the band they no doubt adore?

I saw Soundgarden years ago, and the crowd booed both opening acts, which had obviously been chosen out of love. Chris Cornell bitched the crowd out about it.

[scott pgwp]

It's really got to be a blessing and a curse for Low. I know they opened for Radiohead at one point, too - I think it was the Hail to the Theif tour. On the one hand it had to have been thrilling to get the offer... but could that many people be expected to shut up and listen?

[devon - child drum sets blogger]

I think they will make the best of it. Comes with being an opener, and part of working up. I think I saw that opener for Wilco.

[Brnrbrts]

Aw man. Googling around for "low band tshirt jaws" and found this. That shirt has been haunting me for years, ever since that soul coughing tour. I was always sorry I didn't get one.

I'm happy that slight obsession led me to this piece. Really nice writing. Thanks!

[scott pgwp]

Amazing. Glad you liked the post - sorry I don't have an actual picture of the shirt. I don't know what happened to mine and I googled my brains out trying to find a pic. No luck. Only you and I remember it.